Center's Worker Saves 2 From Fire

Adult Group Home Aide Credited With Rescues

FORT LAUDERDALE - — Joyce Smith didn't know her own strength until a sudden fire forced her to carry two elderly bedridden men to safety on Monday morning.

The 23-year-old housekeeper ran to the aid of two men in an adult group home that caught fire when a cigarette was left smoldering in the linens of a bed.

Both Smith and the group home's caretaker, Tom Curnin, ran into an apartment that had black smoke billowing from a back bedroom. While Curnin pushed his way toward the burning room with a fire extinguisher, Smith ran to the room next door to help out Norman "Shorty" Dicks and Earl Kelly.

"You don't know your strength until you're nervous," said Smith, who works at the New River Villa adult congregate living center in the 400 block of Southwest Seventh Avenue.

A smoke alarm alerted the other 31 group home residents as they ate breakfast in a communal dining room at 7:35 a.m. They were safely evacuated as Fort Lauderdale firefighters were called to the scene, Battalion Fire Chief Steve McInerny said.

Dicks and Kelly were eating breakfast in their room because they are bedridden, Smith said.

Fire damage was estimated at $25,000, with one room gutted and the rest of the apartment suffering heavy heat and smoke damage. Two of the apartment residents were shifted to other rooms within the complex. Four were placed in other group homes, McInerny said.

Smith said she first picked up Kelly from his bed, "but dropped him because I was so nervous."She picked him up a second time to put him in his wheelchair, then quickly wheeled Kelly out of the one-story apartment. Kelly was treated at the scene for first-degree burns on his upper body, McInerny said.

"I was swallowing lots of smoke. I was scared. I was shaky," Smith said.

She then ran back to get Dicks, who suffers from Parkinson's disease. She wrapped her arm around Dicks' waist and half-carried, half-dragged him from the three-bedroom, one-bath apartment, one of a complex of 14 apartments in three adjoining buildings that are licensed to house 35 adults needing care and meals.

"They weren't screaming, but they didn't know what to do," Smith said. "They would have died. I told them there was smoke, but they didn't move."

Sixteen firefighters were on the scene within four minutes of the 911 call, finding heavy black smoke billowing from the concrete block building, no visibility inside and high heat, McInerny said. The fire was out within 10 minutes, but firefighters credited the group home's staff with preventing a possible tragedy.

Curnin, 63, received first-degree burns to his face and was treated on the scene.

"Now I know what smoke inhalation can do," Curnin said. "It was intense. I couldn't even get in the room" with the fire.

One resident, Charlotte Batson, 66, was injured when she fell leaving the building. She was taken to Broward General Medical Center, where she was listed in fair condition.

The home, owned by Tom and Christine McCall, had passed a routine annual fire inspection only a week ago, said fire Lt. Chris Weir, the fire investigator. Its only flaw was that the rear yard gates had been kept locked to prevent people from wandering in, and they were immediately unlocked after the inspection, Weir said.

Although group home residents are not supposed to smoke in their rooms, staffs have a tough time preventing them from sneaking a smoke now and then, Weir said.

Both residents of the burning room denied leaving the cigarette. But firefighters fought a small fire in the same apartment in September, also caused by a smoldering cigarette.